FLIGHT TO AUSTRALIA

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 76, Issue 109, 11 May 1933, Page 7

FLIGHT TO AUSTRALIA

MISS BATTEN TO TRY AGAIN. LONDON, May 9. Miss Jean Batten has returned to England and is preparing for a second attempt to fly to Australia in September after the monsoons. Meantime she is piloting a commercial machine on passenger trips to seaside resorts to regain some of the money lost on the flight. Miss Jean Batten, the New Zealand airwoman, left Lympne on April 9 in an attempt to fly to Australia She used a Gypsy Moth which was previously the property of the Prince of Wales and which she now partly owns. The aeroplane was fitted with long-range tanks, had a cruising speed of 100 miles an hour, and could stay in the air for fourteen hours. Miss batten did not seek to break records, bi:t hoped to complete the flight in a fortnight. Miss Batten, who arrived in England in 1929, had spent. 130 hours in the air before the flight. She re fuelled at Rome and reached Naple* safely. and pushed on to Athens. Atppo, and Bagdad, where she ar rivtG on April 12, leaving for Bushin 1 two hours later. There she encountired a sand storm and made an erne i gency landing on what seemed to be flat land, it proved to do marsh; her aer< plane tilted and the propeller was broke”. S’m was succoured by friendly tribesmen and arrived in Karachi in a motor-lorry. She was unable to locate her machine, and lost her chance of making a record, which hei good start had given her. Ten days later she slipped away by steamer to England, although she was still under medical care.